A low-cost, battery-powered acoustic trap for surveilling male Aedes aegypti during rear-and-release operations.

Brian J Johnson,Kyran M Staunton,Barukh B Rohde,Tim Prachar,Scott A Ritchie,Nicholas Zeak,Lark L Coffey

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0201709

Abstract

The Aedes aegypti mosquito is a primary vector of several serious arboviruses throughout the world and is therefore of great concern to many public health organizations. With vector control methodology pivoting towards rearing and releasing large numbers of genetically modified, sterilized, or Wolbachia-infected male mosquitoes to control vector populations, economical surveillance methods for release tracking becomes increasingly necessary. Previous work has identified that male Ae. aegypti are attracted to female wingbeat frequencies and can be captured through artificial playback of these frequencies, but the tested systems are cost-prohibitive for wide-scale monitoring. Thus, we have developed a simple, low-cost, battery-powered, microcontroller-based sound lure which mimics the wingbeat frequency of female Ae. aegypti, thereby attracting males. We then tested the efficacy of this lure in combination with a passive (non-powered) gravid Aedes trap (GAT) against the current gold-standard, the Biogents Sentinel (BGS) trap, which requires main power (household power) and costs several times what the GAT does. Capture rates of male Ae. aegypti in sound-baited GATs (Sound-GATs) in these field tests were comparable to that of the BGS with no inhibitory effects of sound playback on female capture. We conclude that the Sound-GAT is an effective replacement of the costly BGS for surveillance of male Ae. aegypti mosquitoes, particularly in the developing countries where funding is limited, and has the potential to be adapted to target males of other medically important species.

Highlights

The mosquito Aedes aegypti is the primary vector of dengue, chikungunya, Zika, and yellow fever viruses, causing millions of cases of these mosquito-borne illnesses each year [1,2,3]
When set in the gravid Aedes trap (GAT) (Biogents AG; Regensburg, Germany), the device was placed inside the collection chamber on top of the insect screening, the detailed specifications of which are found in Eiras et al [29] and Ritchie et al [30]
GATs baited with this lure captured just as many males as the current “gold-standard” Biogents Sentinel (BGS) trap and at significant cost savings

Summary

Introduction

The mosquito Aedes aegypti is the primary vector of dengue, chikungunya, Zika, and yellow fever viruses, causing millions of cases of these mosquito-borne illnesses each year [1,2,3]. Findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation. The specific roles of these authors are articulated in the ’author contributions’ section

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion